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The Declining Black Middle Class

The following are excerpts from The American Prospect on the shrinking of the Black Middle Class:

“Two recent reports have highlighted the crippling effects of the subprime mortgage crisis on black families. The first, a Pew study on income and wealth inequality from one generation to the next, showed that only children of the top two quintiles of the wealth distribution—an overwhelmingly white group—had greater wealth than their parents. Half of black children raised in the bottom quintiles stayed there, and blacks on the whole were more likely to be downwardly mobile.”

“A report from The Washington Post, meanwhile, examines the lasting impact on black families’ economic prospects that could stem from their poor credit ratings, which dropped sharply during the recession. With black families more likely to have taken out subprime loans and to have borne the burden of unemployment, their credit scores have suffered, and the black middle class is shrinking as a result.”

So it seems that this recession is having a grave effect on Black America and the Black Middle Class in particular. Sound surprisng? Not to me…not at all. At every turn the GOP/Conservative political agenda has been in my opinion to destroy the middle class in general and widen the gap between the rich and the poor. The issue that this has on Blacks stems from the deeply historical system of racial inequity that always seems to have a greater negative impact on Black people than any other race. This is just another example, and another reason to urge Black Americans to pay close attention to the fine print regarding subprime loans, student loans, and any other sources of potential debt. We are losing the little that we have in the way of homes, property, and other assets, and without the proper understanding of what this means for our future generations, we will continue to suffer and set our children up to start off in bad position with little hope of climbing out and moving forward.